Asked the priest why God made aspie people

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This is why I am not religious. Priests are some of the dumbest people in the world. They are not academics; they rely on one book for all the answers; and they are not counselors. Being an aspie is neither an exemplar nor bane of humanity. It is a condition where an individual brain is literally wired differently than others we consider to be "normal."

Using that priest flawed logic, you could apply the same analogy to race, religion, gender, health, intelligence -- in other words, any difference we may have between us as humans.

The only thing that priest, specifically, and religion in general is good for is reinforcing myth and fear to control people's thoughts and actions.

I cannot believe that a person who claims high moral ground and compassion would make a statement of such stupidity, arrogance and malice to a person who is genuinely suffering.

-Johnathan

yes, it is funny - a perfect word!! ! (now i see what you did there)

The priest is completely wrong. God made people with a wide variety of differences because the world is so complex that different view points are needed if it's going to be appreciated in it's entirety. I do believe that God made aspies because society needs outsiders who can see the world differently. History is full of aspies who made a difference. I would tell the priest that aspies are born for the same reason NT's are born... it says in his catechism "we are born to make manifest the glory of God." You were born to reflect a fragment of His creation and beauty that absolutely nobody else can reflect. You are His child, and don't let the priest suggest anything else.

I would argue that the priest is more likely to be the devil's son, if he can misrepresent God in such a disgusting manner. Basically, he just slandered God. He wants to be very careful about that. Bearing false witness is always bad... but you really DON'T want to bear false witness against God.

It annoys me because it has posters all fired up angrily about something that is very unlikely to have actually happened. Since saying this is out of sync with Catholic teachings, I too call troll. I know not all priests toe the party line exactly, but this is wildly out of sync with both Catholicism and Christianity in general. My parish works hard to accomodate disabled people and I doubt it's some sort of outlier.

To those who think the story is apocryphal. I'm a Christian, and I've heard people say things like this. So, I'm not so sure the story is made up. It could be, certainly, but I'm erring on the side of caution. It's also possible that the priest came out with a longer and more sophisticated argument and the OP didn't catch all the nuances. That can happen too.

What would a priest know about anything?

ruveyn

If he wasn't using a (possibly) made up story about a priest to wind up the denizens of this board, it would be something else.

I thought you were a Buddhist, Janissy? Interesting. I've been quite fascinated by parallels between eastern and Christian contemplative traditions recently.

I do meditate regularly (as described in a series of posts you are remembering) and I have studied Buddhism intellectually, but I'm not a Buddhist in a religious way. Like you've noticed, it isn't really that much of a sideways leap between Catholic meditation and Buddhist meditation. (If you've got rosary beads, it's almost exactly the same thing. )

My daughter dearly loves Mass. It follows a script and that's important to her. Even the social part where you turn to your neighbor and shake hands and say "peace be with you" is scripted. There are elements of Catholicism that are autism-friendly. In modern times, the ritualistic nature of Mass and how it follows a script so exactly. In times past, I can see how living as a monk or nun and taking vows of silence and living a cloistered life could have appealed to people on the spectrum back then. Handling rosary beads would have been a socially accepted stim, too. The downside is that there were probably autistic people burned at the stake for witchcraft if their stims were mistaken for casting a spell.

I've thought about ordaining myself a few times... so I can definitely see the appeal of the monks life.

I've not met many Christians with a meditation practice, so it's quite novel for me and I think pretty cool. Sorry I assumed. Most meditators I know seem to follow an eastern tradition.

Contemporary Christianity, especially the aggressive evangelical sort, seems more bent on ensuring one acquires the blessings of God than on encouraging a contemplative attitude.

Well yes, exactly. There's a big piece missing from religious practice like that.

Wow. I speak my mind and I get burned for it once again...how typical.

THIS IS THE MOST STUPIDEST THING I HAVE HEARD! He made us all different for a good reason and we all have a reason to be on earth otherwise it would be no point being here. "we were the children of the devil" that saying imo is just complete nonsense.

I think spirituality needs a yin and yang. There's a certain acceptance of social injustice in European Catholicism that I found irritating when I was growing up. I appreciate the meditative approach it instilled in me, but I couldn't stomach the social hypocrisy. Yes, I know you get liberation theologians in Catholicism, but I don't live in a South American favela, I live in Manchester; same poverty worse weather . I joined the Quakers because I wanted social righteousness as well as meditativeness. I think many Protestant churches (I'd include the Quakers in this, though they wouldn't include themselves) have more of the self-righteous yang; Catholicism has the smug yin.

Now I don't believe in God at all, so practising an Abrahamic religion is pretty pointless for me. I know you don't have to believe in God to be a Quaker (in Britain at least) nowadays, but that always seemed disrespectful to the original intent of that organisation - so I stopped going to meetings.

Sorry to butt in on the conversation. I just wanted to concur that Catholicism is meditative and offer my own slant.

As a Catholic, I am sorry that you had to hear that...

We do live in a fallen world, yes, that is what we believe, but as a result, none of our minds, not even the NT folk's work perfectly. It is just what is "normal" has been accepted for so many eons that it has become the standard despite not being absolutely perfect, everyone has weaknesses. When those with Asperger's are introduced, well, we are viewed as "abnormal" or "ill" when in reality, everyone is. If that makes any sense...

I have actually had opposite responses from priests when I tell them about Asperger's. That there is indeed a purpose for why we think different that is for the better. Because we think in a different way, we are more capable of thinking of new ideas that can change the world for the better.

Hi, troll! Haven't seen you in a while!

Well seeing as this topic is of interest to me (and I'm sure to many others) I guess I'll feed you this one time....

I've heard this being said before about disability. I think it's a sick way of justifying why unfortunate or difficult things happen in the world. Although Aspergers is certainly not (at least in my opinion) the worst thing you can live with and I honestly don't think it's the worst thing (or among the worst things) that I've ever had to live with, that's a pretty dicky thing to do to someone. People don't want to accept that s**t happens, so they up BS by saying that certain people suffer to make other people feel better about themselves. Is it just me or is schadenfruede kind of the opposite of what Jesus was promoting? I would be pretty pissed off too if someone said that my soul purpose in life was to "suffer" to allow others to mentally masturbate about how goshdarn lucky they are.

This is one of the reasons why I feel religion can be very damaging.